Building Bridges, Not Walls: Navigating Conflict in Relationships. Part 2
Part 1 of this series explored common conflict patterns in relationships, particularly the “attack-withdraw” cycle. In this pattern, one partner confronts an issue while the other withdraws or placates to get the heat off. Vulnerability is needed to break down emotional walls and build stronger connections. In Part 2 here, you’ll discover why you get so upset during conflicts. You’ll learn strategies to re-center and connect with your Authentic Wise Self. Using Internal Family Systems, you’ll increase your ability to communicate adeptly because you’ll be more self-aware. These are the first steps in effective conflict management.
The Neuroscience of Conflict
People often feel emotionally threatened when there’s conflict. Why? Because they don’t feel safe and secure with the other person. This is the core concept of Attachment Theory.
Your brain – your amygdala — fires with ancient instinctual ways of protecting yourself: fight, flight, freeze, faint, or fawn (pleasing behavior). The rational pre-frontal cortex can’t operate when you are flooded.
If you don’t ground yourself before you speak or act, you can’t think clearly enough to use productive conflict management tools. You have to get centered first. Here are the steps.
First, realize that you are triggered. Observe yourself. Know when to stop and self-soothe.
How do you know when you are triggered?
Be mindful and observe your behavior and emotions. Does your voice get a certain tone? Do you get angry or irritated? Do you get tense? Do you go quiet? Do you raise your voice? Blame or accuse? Criticize? Do you get overly logical, and you don’t speak from your heart?
Close your eyes, and do a body scan from head to foot. Where do you feel tense? Does your stomach feel tight? Does your chest feel heavy? Is there a lump in your throat? Do your jaws clench? Rate the level of activation on a 1 to 10 scale where 10 is high.
You can use a device such as HeartMath to give you real-time feedback on how stressed you are. You can see when you have calmed down. An Oura Ring will help you see your stress levels retrospectively. A pulse-oxygen meter can help, too. If your heart rate increases above 100 (for non-athletes), you are stressed. When couples are stressed, their pulses are often more than 100.
Two: self-soothe.
You must deactivate your amygdala so you can get centered in your body and think clearly. Here are a few options.
1. Breathe: Take 10 deep slow breaths. Inhale for 5 seconds. Exhale for 6 seconds. Imagine moving the air through your nose down into your belly, which should expand as if you were blowing air into a balloon.
2. Imagine a peaceful safe place: Feel the tension flowing out your feet into the ground. The Earth transmutes the tension into neutral energy like compost to grow new plants. Continue breathing until you feel your body relax to level 3-4.
3. Progressive Relaxation: Inhale. Make a fist with your hands. Hold the tension for five seconds. Exhale and let go of the tension. Repeat that one time. Continue this with each muscle group, moving from the top of your body to the bottom.
4. Sensory Awareness: Name 5 things you observe in your surroundings: what you see, hear, touch, smell, and taste.
Three: Internal Family Systems Parts Work
Imagine that you have sub-personalities. If you saw the movies “Inside Out 1 and 2,” you know what I mean. As proposed by Internal Family Systems, we all have parts. There are no good or bad parts. They are just parts. When they get triggered, they can raise havoc, causing you to withdraw and lash out.
When you become curious and bring compassion to your parts, they calm down because they feel understood by you. We all just want to be understood, don’t we? So do our parts.
When we observe our parts mindfully without judgment, we are seated in our Wise Authentic Self. We’re objective. We can listen to our parts and not be “blended” with our parts.
Here’s an example.
Instead of saying, “I’m angry with you,” you would say, “A part of me feels angry with you. Part of me loves you very much.” This helps other people feel less defensive. There is more to you than the angry part. Your Wise Self is present with the angry part. We never have just one part.
Ask the angry part if it is willing to speak with your Wise Self to gain insight instead of reacting in automatic reactive ways. Your Wise Self does not condemn the angry part. You realize that it is trying to protect a vulnerable part of you.
The Garage Conflict example from Part 1: Helen’s angry part lashes out at Harry for not cleaning the garage as he promised.
Connecting with her Wise Self and being mindful, Helen says, “Harry, part of me feels angry that you haven’t cleaned the garage. I asked you to do it two weeks ago. A part of me gets irritated because it feels like a parent talking to an irresponsible child.
This part gets angry because I want an adult-adult loving relationship where we both conscientiously take care of household chores. This part gets angry because I don’t feel safely attached with you. In marriage, we should both feel safe and secure with each other. If this part of me can’t count on you for the little things, it concludes that I can’t count on you for the big things. This part deduces that it must continue to carry the bulk of the burdens on its shoulders. It feels weighted down. Exhausted.
Can you see how different this is from the typical way Helen approaches Harry as described in part 1?
As Helen becomes more aware of her parts, she’s more self-responsible. She shares about herself in a more vulnerable way rather than accusing Harry. He can hear her better so he’s not as inclined to placate and then withdraw from Helen.
Vulnerability pulls for empathy. Helen’s vulnerability pulls for Harrys’ empathy.
Helen is growing in emotional mastery. However, she has more work to do. She still thinks her happiness depends on Harry behaving the way she wants. She hates that because she prides herself on her independence.
Helen’s challenge: How can she maintain a solid sense of self and create a fulfilling intimate relationship? I call that “interdependence.” Healthy couples take responsibility for themselves, do their inner healing work, and consciously co-create their ideal relationship.
In part three of this series, Helen starts to explore the vulnerable part of herself hidden beneath her anger. With the help of her Wise Self, she begins to uncover the deep pain she’s kept buried for so long underneath her high-achieving pattern. She realizes there’s a new challenge, one that will require her to face something even more profound that will change her forever.
Contact Information
Benita A. Esposito is a licensed psychotherapist, spiritual counselor, life coach, and ordained minister.
She is the best-selling author of The Gifted Highly Sensitive Introvert: Wisdom for Emotional Healing and Expressing Your Authentic Self,available on Amazon.
Four decades ago, she earned a master’s degree in clinical psychology. How does her experience benefit you? You’ll make faster progress because of the wisdom she embodies. She quickly spots patterns to reach the bottom line so you don’t waste precious time. She follows a grace-filled Christian path that honors all faiths. For fun, she grows beautiful flower gardens. She loves to hike through forests to waterfalls. Her inner shutterbug shot most of the photos on this website.
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